Lineup Rollout #3: The Heavy Stuff

From crackling doom metal to rousing metalcore to heavy, heavy noise – we’ve got all shades of black covered at the‘Grass. Come on down and get heavy.

Crossfaith

Breakneck, pulsing metal-meets-electronica that’ll have you moshing AND raving

“So what can fans expect from today’s performance?”

“Chaos!”

One of the rowdiest live experiences available on Planet Earth.

Crossfaith have been memorably described as “Slipknot tearing The Prodigy limb from limb”. Their brand of metal-meets-dance music creates an atmosphere somewhere between a mosh pit and a dancefloor. It’s huge – big bass, screaming guitars, flashing lights.

This Tokyo band conducts an infernal headbanger’s orchestra. “On stage… We always think about how to get the audience crazy,” says vocalist Kenta Koie. “Every single time is the best moment in my life. Stages have magic. Only performers can feel this.”

So can every single person at a Crossfaith set. When they say jump, reach for the skies.

Late evening Saturday, Stage Left.

Ho99o9

Punk rock hip-hop that’s brash, provocative and blood-curdlingly LOUD

Punk’s not dead.

In ho99o9’s gloriously unhinged live performances, the spirit, beliefs and sound of punk lives on: alive and kicking, shape-shifting into new hybrid genres. Machine-gunning conventions into oblivion.

Ho99o9 are hip-hop for people who don’t normally listen to much hip-hop.

This is spoken word fire for residents of HeavyWorld – noise, drone, metal, punk, hardcore – any sonic weapon that can help ho99o9 take potshots against police brutality, racism, the excesses of capitalism.

This is unflinching, in-your-face political hip-hop. Designed to make you uncomfortable. Merciless and intimidating. Wild and untamed.

We here at the ‘Grass are terrified and excited to present ho99o9: this is not for the faint-of-heart, but they are nothing short of a force of nature.

Un-fucking-missable. Late evening Saturday, Wooozy Dimension.

Chaos Mind

First class riffery from Shanghai’s finest, heaviest, metal band

Brothers and Sisters of HeavyWorld, this one’s for you.

Chaos Mind have been sludging it out for close to a decade, and they’re one of the best noise-mongers in this fine land. Some really solid metal / doom.

Black Metal Chinese opera, played out in glorious cinematic widescreen.

Oh man, Zuriaake.

We know that the point of these bios is to introduce you to bands playing at the‘Grass, but for Zuriaake we almost wish we could tell you nothing. Just a simple missive: “GO. SEE. THEM.”

Even the weather gods were curious last year –Zuriaake’s planned Stage Left outing was cut short by two typhoons, and the show was moved to Yuyintang for a few hundred dedicated punters. This year, though, they’re back for a second shot at the big stage.

Formed in 2001, Zuriaake are veterans of Chinese black metal. On record, their sound is sumptuous: lush orchestration, like a soundtrack to a big-budget fantasy epic and shimmering, atmospheric canyons of sound. Marching through these soundscapes – crackling, crumbling bursts of black metal fury.

But seeing them live is where the sound comes to life, like a spellbinding reanimation. Zuriaake treat every song like a story to be told, with elaborate costumes straight out of wuxia films, flourishes of on-stage theatrics, moody lighting, smoke machines shrouding the stage in clouds of atmosphere and monologues in classical Chinese(古诗). One of their stand out tracks sees the band enacting a sinister ‘corpse walking’ (赶尸) ceremony. Like the best dark thrillers, you can’t look away.

Embrace the dark. After the sun goes down, Saturday, Stage Left.

Container (Live)

An insane madman whose noise-techno will make your body move in strange ways

Forget what you know about dance music.

Here’s what Vice said about the experience of seeing Container live:

“I have always felt moments of utter confusion and utter ecstasy during his performances. I simultaneously want to bang my head so fucking hard, and groove my hips so fucking smooth; and somehow my body lets me do both.”